


The Fallacy of Perpetual Motion

by XZeroQueen



Category: Descendants (Disney Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Angst, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-27
Updated: 2018-12-27
Packaged: 2019-09-28 09:09:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,180
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17180096
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/XZeroQueen/pseuds/XZeroQueen
Summary: The problem with perpetual motion is that it cannot exist. Energy must come from somewhere; it cannot give rise to itself.So is the case for Carlos de Vil and Ben. They need a new element, a catalyst, to fuel a chemical reaction that will sustain them.Ben is only too happy to contribute what energy he can, despite Carlos’s fears. And Carlos… Carlos doesn’t know what he can offer. But he’ll try.Soulmate AU





	The Fallacy of Perpetual Motion

**Author's Note:**

  * For [georgiehensley](https://archiveofourown.org/users/georgiehensley/gifts).



> Writing this fic was a challenge! But I hope everyone enjoys it and I did the ship justice.

Ben never could remember the day the phantom bruises first showed up on his arm. He was only three years old, and no amount of wishing from his older self would bring the memories back from his younger brain.

His parents, however, would never forget, even though their desire was just as intense as Ben’s wish to remember.

They looked to each other as the first bruise appeared without cause on their son’s wrist and frowned as he exclaimed, hand flying to the affected spot, “ow!”

An accident, they thought, Ben’s soulmate must have simply had a fall as toddlers were so prone to. Their little bodies were, after all, so very clumsy.

But then they saw the shape of the thing; fingers, great big fingers.

Still they tried to convince themselves it was an innocent injury, even though, in their hearts, they knew the truth.

Still, the human brain is a strange force. It can rewrite memories and perception so well that its owner becomes convinced of a new reality. With willpower alone, the King and Queen of Auradon managed to almost convince themselves of the complete lie.

The finger-shaped bruises were simply an accident; a too-strong grip that saved a child from a dangerous tumble.

The black eye, of course, was from running into a doorknob or some other object face-first.

The broken finger was a slam in the door. In fact, they’d tell themselves, Ben himself had done just the same thing not too long ago.

The cigarette burn was harder to explain, but… well, children were capable of all sorts of mischief, weren’t they? In childlike curiosity, they must have simply grabbed something, and then promptly dropped it onto themselves.

They explored every possibility in their minds… all except one.

It couldn’t be that their child’s soulmate had such a horrible, even abusive, person in his or her life. How could it even be possible, anyway, they asked themselves, in a country such as Auradon? Where goodness was never better? No, for such a thing to happen, Ben’s soulmate would have to be from the Isle of the Lost itself, and that was just absurd. Villains didn’t have soulmates; that was just common sense. To have a soulmate, one had to have a soul first.

No, they decided. Ben’s soulmate was simply a clumsy child, somewhere out there, who would grow into their body sooner or later.

They just wished Ben’s soulmate would do that soon, because they hated how much pain Ben seemed to always be in from those strange accidents.

“Kids, right?” they’d say to anyone who saw Ben’s bruises. They’d shake their heads and share a laugh, and deny to everyone that there was even a hint of unease in their laughter.

—

Carlos didn’t have a soulmate. He knew he didn’t, because he had never had a mark.

Or maybe he did have one.

How would he know? Finding an injury to mirror a soulmate’s wouldn’t be like finding a needle in a haystack as much it it would be like finding a needle in a stack of needles.

What was the point of speculating? He might never know, and he far preferred using his time to investigate the world around him through science.

A soulmate couldn’t help him invent a machine to diagnose faults in the various broken appliances he found on a daily basis, and that task was, at the moment, of far more interest to his young brain.

Soulmates didn’t help the prisoners on the Isle survive. Toughness- or, lacking that, ingenuity- did.

—

One day, soon before Ben’s eighth birthday, the bruises got to be too many, too hard to explain. It was clear the excuses (lies, Belle would think in her darker moments, just like a villain) weren’t working anymore.

And so the Royal Family made a hastily-planned trip to Arendelle, quiet and without a fuss at their behest- let the Prince enjoy his birthday vacation in peace.

Ben would remember it as one of the best birthdays of his life. The snow was beautiful, and Olaf was an endless stream of the most fun games Ben had ever played. The only regret Ben had was that his parents so cruelly refused to let him bring Olaf home to be his nanny.

Well, that, and that the trolls insisted on taking away his soulmate marks.

His young brain didn’t know everything about soulmates, but he knew they were important. He knew his friends all had them, and he knew that they meant somewhere out there was someone who would love him one day.

And losing the marks meant losing all of those things, and so he argued.

“It’s not fair!” Ben said, stomping his foot. “Why don’t I get a soulmate anymore?”

“You still do, Ben. This just will stop the pain. You’ll get your memories back one day… I promise,” Adam said, looking deeply troubled. Guilty, even, which was strange for a man who had taught Ben to be unfailingly good. “You will.”

Ben was about to argue, but suddenly, he couldn’t remember what he was upset about. Olaf, he eventually decided. They must have been arguing about his new best friend again. It wasn’t fair! Why did Olaf have to stay in Arendelle? Queen Elsa could create another snowman to play with.

Still, despite that explanation his mind provided, sometimes he would look to the perfect skin on his body, and wonder if it was really supposed to be that way.

—

Carlos knew he had a birthday; everyone had one. He knew, based on the age he had been when he entered school and the grade he was in now, that he must have had his sixth birthday at some point recently.

(Yen Sid, soon to become his mentor, would praise him for his skills in deductive reasoning.)

But Carlos didn’t know when that had happened. Any attempts to ask Cruella would be met with an accusation that he wanted to know solely so he could celebrate it, and therefore take away the praise she deserved for birthing him in the first place. “Why would someone want to celebrate you?” she’d sneer, raising a hand.

Finally, for the purposes of timekeeping, Carlos took to calling January first his date of birth. It only had a one in three hundred and sixty-five chance of being correct, but so did the other days. It was as good a guess as any.

That year, his “birthday” was marked as special only by the rare victory he got in persuading Cruella to give up on beating him for leaving a speck of dust on her cabinet; a feat he accomplished by promising her a machine that would keep dust away forever. Of course, when the reality of just how impossible his promise was hit him, he panicked, but the damage was already done. He escaped being beaten, but with an unspoken promise of something far worse if he failed. A battle won, but a war potentially lost.

Still, exploring the limits of machinery would be interesting, even if he did fail.

All in all, it wasn’t too horrible a birthday. He hadn’t been beaten, had escaped being bullied too horribly at school, and had a new project to occupy his mind. It could have been far worse.

—

Ben couldn’t pinpoint the day his thoughts started to change. Really, he only realized they had done so when his parents were called in to school for a conference to discuss Ben’s recent problem with daydreaming in class, and the resulting slip in grades from the otherwise model student.

Only Ben wasn’t daydreaming at all. He was gazing out at the Isle of the Lost and half wondering, half worrying about them.

“Ben,” Belle prodded after the meeting’s end, a hand cupping his chin to make him look at her. “Why aren’t you paying attention in class, mon cher garçon?”

Ben fidgeted, weight shifting rapidly from one leg to the other. Would confessing the truth help, or would it make his parents angry? Would they think he was questioning their judgment in creating the Isle in the first place? But even so, would he be able to think of a convincing lie fast enough?

“Ben?” Adam prompted, kneeling next to Ben.

Ben let out a sigh. “It’s almost Christmas,” he said softly.

Belle let out a gentle laugh, ruffling his hair. “It sure is! Now why do you look so sad about it?”

“I’m kind of…” He paused, searching for the right word. He always had been extremely precise in his speech; an abnormal quality for any child except royalty.

What was the right word? He wasn’t nervous, really. Nor was he just concerned.

“I’m worried,” was what he finally decided on.

“Worried about what, mon cher?” Belle asked, eyes filled with kindness.

“The kids on the Isle,” he whispered; the words were for her ears only. While Belle was equally responsible for the Isle’s creation as Adam, she wasn’t as touchy when it came to anything that could be construed as a criticism.

“What about them?” Belle pressed, voice free of judgment.

“If there’s no magic on the Isle, then Santa can’t get there, can he?” he asked her, worry entering his voice. “How can they have Christmas?”

Belle knelt in front of Ben, taking his hands in hers. “Mon cher,” she said softly. “Santa doesn’t go to the Isle. The children there are all very, very naughty. Just like their parents.” She paused. “I’m sure they do have Christmas there. But it’s their own celebration, different from ours. I don’t think any of them would want to celebrate it the way we do.”

Ben looked down, lightly kicking at the ground as he digested the new information. “But what if,” he finally ventured, “what if one wasn’t naughty or wanted to celebrate Christmas like we do?”

“None of them do, Ben. None of them,” Belle assured him, looking into his eyes.

His parents had never lied to him, ever. Only villains lied; Ben knew that as well as anyone in Auradon.

So why couldn’t he believe her?

—

The day was here.

After putting Cruella off as long as he could, Carlos was finally out of excuses. The dusting machine was already built, and the rational side of Carlos knew it would function.

But the part of him that was controlled by fear, the part of his brain that planned every minute of every day around just surviving, was terrified. What if it didn’t work? What if Cruella hated the thing, and then- and then?-

But there was no choice but to move forward, because delaying any longer would result in a severe punishment regardless. He was lucky that he was able to test his device on his own first, before presenting it to Cruella.

And so, in his treehouse, Carlos found himself closing his eyes, afraid to see the result of the simple action.

“Hydrogen,” he said softly, setting his hand on the switch. Reciting the periodic table rarely failed to help calm him down, unless it was an extremely intense panic attack.

“Helium,” he continued, not moving.

“Lithium,” he said, stronger, but still not acting yet.

“Beryllium.” He forced his eyes open. A breath escaped him, and then he drew in a deep one, chest expanding.

“Boron.” He gathered all the courage that could be contained in his small body.

“Carbon.” This time he even managed to smile a little. Carbon was his favorite element for how crucial it was to life.

“Nitrogen.” He set a hand over the switch, hovering but not touching.

“Oxygen.” Finally he made contact with the device, the anxiety charging the air like static electricity.

“Fluorine.” He closed his eyes again, but only for a moment.

“Neon… here we go.” Slowly, as though it would all fall apart if he moved faster than a turtle’s heartbeat, he moved the switch to its on position.

With a soft humming noise, his modified air purifier awakened, slowly but surely sucking the dust and other debris from the air. Carlos saw it, saw the little cobwebs and specks of dust disappear from a neglected corner in the treehouse that he had never been tall enough to get to.

“It worked?” he whispered to himself, knees going weak with relief. “It worked… it actually worked…” In awe he stepped back, watching his creation at work.

In that moment, watching what he had created, Carlos was Beethoven, and the machine was his symphony. Every rotation of the machine’s internal gears, in a steady, flawless rhythm, was his orchestra, waiting for the rise and fall of the conductor’s baton. The hum was a melody that could not have been more beautiful if it was a choir singing Ode to Joy. He watched as the notations of his magnum opus transformed into a haunting performance, the symphony and chorus blending to give life to art he had created.

Suddenly, it occurred to Carlos that despite his doubts, he did have a soulmate after all, and it was named Science. It was a companion without life, and therefore, without the ability to act. It would never hurt him or mock him or let him down. It would be by his side always, in sunlight, in ocean waves, in invention, in his own heartbeat.

The instant the realization hit him, Carlos decided that Science was the only soulmate he would ever want. No human being would do.

—

Ben was starting to doubt that he had a soulmate at all. He had no marks and no feelings that belonged to someone else, the way those who had a soulmate did. Others could feel when their soulmate was hurting- physically, or emotionally. But Ben didn’t feel anything at all.

The thought filled him with an intense sadness.

And then he was torn between guilt at possibly inflicting such distress on someone else, if there was anyone bonded to him… and hope that there was someone feeling such a thing. Someone, somewhere.

—

Years passed. Every year drew Carlos deeper inside himself. Failed again and again by those around him, he stopped trusting them, stopped desiring human interaction. Why bother, when he had his own mind to entertain him?

Which wasn’t to say he had no one. He had Mal, and Evie, and Jay. They were his friends, his family. But there were things even they couldn’t provide him, and they all had walls. Sure, over time they added windows and doors only they had keys for, but walls were walls. And Carlos’s grew stronger and taller as time went on.

For Ben, it was more complicated. Part of him wanted to withdraw, too; feeling isolated already from his peers with the knowledge that he had no soulmate, and they did. It felt like he was incomplete, and his friends were just a reminder of what he would never have.

And yet another part of him felt that, if he really was destined not to have that special person, he at least ought to find as many friends as he could to fill the void.

It was a slow and predictable ride on a ferris wheel, sinking down to his lowest and loneliest moments, and then floating back up skyward.

Up and down. Up and down. Up and down.

Over and over, year by year, until his sixteenth birthday.

The day he could finally make his second strongest wish, his altruistic one, a reality. The kids from the Isle of the Lost deserved a new start, even if Ben’s parents denied it.

—

One hour in Auradon, and Carlos had already recited the Periodic Table more times than he could count. There were far too many new and startling things and the anxiety kept building inside him, growing unbearably large and threatening to consume him whole.

By far the worst had been that horrible statue, transforming into a monster solely (it felt like) to scare Carlos. Part of him knew it couldn’t be only to scare him, and yet it felt far too coincidental. His biggest fear was beasts, and within minutes of his arrival an ordinary statue had transformed into that very thing. It let him irritable for the rest of their tour of Auradon Prep, enough to cause even Mal to worry about him, though she didn’t say anything until the four were left alone at last.

It was bad enough to have his worst fear come to life, but the unfamiliarity of the place made it even worse. All the rules he knew, had been able to count on, were out the window. A lifetime of getting by without magic and now the thing was everywhere and he couldn’t escape it, despite their claims of slowly phasing it out.

And the soon-to-be king! Something about him unnerved Carlos. It wasn’t him, exactly, and yet it was. He was too good. There had to be something hiding beneath the surface. And a hidden villain, Carlos knew from experience, was the most dangerous kind. The most effective villains he’d known had been able to blend in until the right moment.

Like Jafar, or his own mother.

It all left Carlos with a miserable, anxious feeling in his belly. Was Auradon just going to be more of the same?

Heaving a sigh, Carlos threw himself back on his new bed. He didn’t know what he’d been expecting.

—

… But it hadn’t been that.

No, Ben hadn’t at all expected the reactions he’d gotten from Mal, Jay, Evie and Carlos. He hadn’t expected instant friendship, knew there had to be far too much resentment for it to be that way, but the sheer frostiness of their attitudes (save Evie, perhaps) had hurt more than he wanted to admit. It was like they weren’t there.

Was it a trauma thing, he wondered, or a “we hate you” thing? Logic said that it was the former; his insecurities screamed that it was the louder. And as his father had shown him in those royal meetings, the louder voice got listened to. “The squeaky wheel gets the grease, Ben. To make them see it your way, be louder until they have no choice but to listen.” That was how Adam got things done, and the rule applied inside his own head too, even if Ben himself would never do such a thing to others.

And so his fear began to take over. Had he made a mistake? Had he made life even harder for the four teens? Had the risk he’d taken in causing his father to have a temper tantrum been all for naught?

Biting his lip, Ben sank onto his bed, gazing up at the ceiling, and tried to comfort himself. It could be worse, he told himself. They could have tried to start a fire the instant they were on the mainland. They could have cursed someone. Maybe their coldness was just… anxiety. Just like he’d feel if he suddenly landed on the Isle of the Lost.

It was a small comfort, but it helped just enough to allow him to fall asleep, albeit an uneasy one.

—

As a general rule, Carlos knew from his vast knowledge of chemistry, a given atom wanted nothing more than to have a full shell of valence electrons. It was the entire reason for ionic and covalent bonds. Seeking to complete themselves, the atoms would join themselves to another.

That was how Carlos saw the bonded pairs of soulmates he saw in Auradon. He didn’t see an overwhelming amount, not at their age, but even the ones who were alone talked about the person they knew was out there because of the marks on their bodies and the strange, foreign feelings they felt sometimes. It was just chemistry, people seeking a bond that would complete them.

But Carlos already had a full valence shell. He was a noble gas; stable, unreactive, and needing nothing from any other element.

He was more than happy being the odd one out, even among his friends. Now that they were off the Isle, Mal and Evie had begun to feel each other’s emotions, though without figuring out that it was each other they were feeling. Evie was delighted to find her person; Mal was terrified. They’d realize the truth soon enough, and Carlos was faithful they would come to enjoy the new dimension to their bond. And Jay had gotten a tiny cut the other day that had no business being there. He had a soulmate, too, somewhere.

Seeing these new signs for themselves, and seeing the lack of them in Carlos, had caused the three to realize what Carlos knew long ago. Evie pitied him for it, Mal envied him, and Jay didn’t care as long as Carlos didn’t.

Carlos didn’t know how to explain his own completeness to them. His bond was inherent, a link with science, with earth and the stars and animals and computers. He didn’t think he could explain it.

But the great thing about his friends was that they would never ask him to.

—

There was a very particular pattern to who Ben would seek out in his moments of distress.

He would find his mother if it was a temporary sort of sadness that could be fixed, or at least significantly lightened easily. Her hugs couldn’t be beat, and her gentle words of encouragement were always right for a lost Tourney game or worries about his fitness to be King of Auradon.

He would find his father only if it was a political matter. He would listen to other issues, but never did much to fix them. Sometimes he even made them worse.

He’d go to his grandpère if he wanted a distraction. He would watch the strange machines “crazy old Maurice” had assembled over the years, enquiring the purpose of each one.

“The guys” could always be counted on for pizza, video games, and ribbing that didn’t go over the line too much.

And when those failed, it was because of one problem in particular. And that meant he’d be better off at the lake.

He stood at the edge of the water, a stone in his hand, eying the stone for a long moment before skipping it as best he could on the surface of the water. It hopped once, then sank with a subdued splash.

“Try throwing it at less of an angle,” a voice suddenly cut in, and Ben jumped before whirling around to meet the intruder who was already apologizing profusely.

“Carlos! It’s alright, it’s alright- you just startled me!” Ben exclaimed, setting one hand on his chest to feel his racing heart.

“Sorry,” Carlos almost-whispered. “I didn’t-“

“No, it’s okay!” Ben held his hands up. “Really. You guys just… you all walk quiet.”

Carlos thought about this before nodding his agreement. “I suppose we do. Not really quieter than anyone on the Isle, but here…”

Laughing awkwardly, Ben picked up his stone again, throwing it the way Carlos had suggested. “You guys know a lot of cool things. You’re like ninjas.” It was his attempt to give Carlos an out- to let him avoid talking seriously about the Isle.

Carlos took it with silent yet palpable gratitude. “Yeah, we just need some throwing stars!”

“How about a rock?” Ben grinned and handed the flattest one he could find to Carlos, who took it with a calculating expression before standing in silence. “Aren’t you going to throw it?”

“Yeah,” Carlos said, but still made no move. His thumb glided slowly over the surface as he looked from the sky to the lake to his stone before he tilted back and launched the rock. It bounced ten times- ten!- before coming to rest in the middle of the lake.

Whistling in appreciation, Ben held out his fist for Carlos to bump. “That was awesome!” He beamed at the youngest of his new companions, glancing between him and the fading ripples of water his rock had left in its wake. “How did you do it?”

Carlos chewed on his words for a long moment. “I just calculated a good angle, really. Some guessing, and some guesstimating.”

He was being modest, and Ben knew it, but he pretended to take the statement at face value.

Jay, Evie, Mal and Carlos. They were such a talented group of teenagers. They were artists and athletes and geniuses, and yet they were so scarred that they hadn’t known they’d had the ability (like Jay’s athleticism), or thought it was shameful (Mal’s art), or thought they weren’t capable at all, (like Evie’s fashion) or thought it was nothing of interest (Carlos’s intelligence).

They were so bright and it pained Ben to think what growing up on the Isle had done to them.

It wasn’t fair.

How could his own parents have done something so horrible?

“Hey, um…” Ben became aware, suddenly, of a hand on his shoulder, and of Carlos’s voice, as unsure as he’d ever heard it. “Are you okay? You’re… you’re crying?”

He was. God damn it, he was crying, the one thing his father had said would make him weak.

“I just-“ How could he cry about the injustice of the Isle to someone who had just escaped it? He couldn’t be selfish on top of being weak. “I have a lot on my mind.”

Carlos was quiet for a long moment, and then he bent down, picking up two stones. He handed one to Ben, and kept one for himself. “I know I’m not much, but I can listen. You know, if you want to talk. Or if you don’t, that’s cool too. I don’t always want to talk either.” Uncomfortable, he shifted positions to turn his head just a little- enough to put their gazes out of alignment, but not enough to be rude.

Taking the stone gratefully, Ben turned it over and over in his hands. “I don’t know where to start, really. It’s a lot of things. Stupid stuff, probably. I worry I won’t be a good king. I worry I’ll make the same mistakes he did.”

“That’s not stupid.” Carlos shook his head adamantly. “If you worry about that stuff, that means you don’t want to repeat his mistakes, right? And that’s already a step in the right direction. It means you don’t want to hurt people.”

Ben winced, coming to a realization- one he saw mirrored in Carlos’s eyes. “Our parents really aren’t that different, are they?” he asked aloud, sadness clouding his voice.

“I mean,” Carlos said, trailing off awkwardly. “I’m not gonna say he’s evil or anything like that. But… history is written by the winners, you know? And if his name was Gaston instead of Adam, and he’d done this…”

“He’d be vilified forever,” Ben finished, looking downward and swallowing against the newly formed lump in his throat. “And he’d deserve it.”

“Yeah. He would,” Carlos agreed, voice quiet, gazing off into the distance. “Gaston’s one of the most respected men on the Isle, but he’s also one of the most hated, because-“

“Because he never killed my dad,” Ben said, voice just above a whisper.

Carlos nodded, but looked guilty as he realized exactly what he had said. “I… I mean. I’m sure he’s a good dad,” he said lamely.

“Yeah.” Ben chuckled, awkward and miserable, wishing he could scream the truth.

—

There was a strange bond that came out of sharing a vulnerable moment. Carlos had no words for it; no comparisons in his almost encyclopedic mind. They had shared a weakness, and yet that weakness made them stronger, closer.

At first it had simply been awkward nods and smiles at lunch and in passing, and then it was something… else. Carlos found himself understanding Ben’s worries, and even being able to offer advice. And he found Ben doing the same, and even more miraculous- the advice helped.

It was strange. Strange, and not unpleasant- which only made it even stranger.

—

“You don’t have one, do you?” Carlos’s voice was curious, as opposed to sympathetic. It made Ben feel easier answering the question.

“No,” he said, shaking his head. He had been watching a pair of their classmates who had recently discovered their bond, Chad and Audrey. As thrilled as he was for his dear friends, it stirred the same emotions soulmates always did for him, and he had been- apparently- too obvious in staring.

“I don’t either,” Carlos said quietly. “I don’t mind… but you do, don’t you?”

Ben nodded silently, lump rising in his throat. Yes, it did, more than he could put into words. “I want someone,” he whispered. “More than anything.”

Raising his hand, then dropping it in an abortive gesture to comfort Ben, Carlos suggested, “that means you could have anyone, though. Anyone whose soulmate isn’t romantic, or who loses theirs…” Then he winced as the implication of his own words hit him. “I mean, not that you’d want that to happen. But you could still have someone, you know?”

Ben smiled sadly and shook his head. “But it’s not the same, is it?”

“No,” Carlos agreed. “But you can find other things that are just as good.”

Ben would have written it off as a weak attempt to cheer him up, if not for the fact that Carlos’s face could not have made it more clear that he truly believed what he was saying. Something in his life- his friends, Dude, science, maybe all three- allowed him to feel whole.

For the first time, Ben envied him.

“Anyway…” Carlos said, slow and awkward due to Ben’s silence. “I hope you find what you’re looking for soon.”

“Me too,” Ben said softly. Then, after a moment of thought, “and I hope that… that what you have stays what you want.”

Carlos smiled at him, and Ben smiled back despite himself.

—

Secrets were rather like a caged animal. The longer they were trapped, the more desperate they were to get out. And their escape was inevitable, the only question being whether it was on their own or with the help of their captor.

For Belle and Adam, the secret’s escape was completely unexpected, and at the worst possible time. It had been well-contained, controlled, for so many years, until… until.

Until Ben had asked about his soulmate again, looking so empty, so lost, that they had just had to assure him that they knew his person was out there.

And Ben, clever and inquisitive as he was, had had to ask how they could be sure. How could they know when he had never felt a single sensation from his supposed soulmate?

They were backed into a corner then, had tried their best to wiggle out of it, but Ben realized the truth. Knew they knew something he didn’t.

And so the truth had bolted from its cage, faster than they could comprehend. Yes, Ben had a soulmate; yes, he had had the marks once. And yes, there was a reason he didn’t remember.

The look of betrayal on their son’s face was far more painful than seeing the injuries he’d had as a child.

The venom Ben’s voice as he spat, “not even a villain on the Isle would do this!” was worse.

Worst of all was Ben’s immediate planning to go to Arendelle to reverse the block… alone.

—

Carlos was more than used to anxiety, but this sensation was something far more than that. It was an uneasy feeling, and a deep ache inside that just felt like his whole world was being torn apart.

It hurt. Betrayal had to be the most painful emotion in the world. It was one he had experienced only rarely- betrayal required liking someone, trusting them- but his few experiences told him more than enough.

And on top of the feeling itself was the knowledge that it wasn’t his at all. He didn’t know how he knew. It was just a part of the emotion, part of the thoughts racing through his mind.

It was so very unsettling.

And the worst part of all was the slow, creeping realization of just what could cause those phantom emotions. It wasn’t possible to have a soulmate after all this time. He didn’t want one. But here he was.

How would he tell his soulmate, when they met, that he just wanted to be left on his own? How could he do such a thing without crushing them?

—

The flood of emotions Ben felt the instant the trolls lifted the block was like nothing he had ever felt before. It was overwhelming at first, frightening, and he immediately fell to his knees in tears, knocked over by the wave of emotions.

Joy that he had a soulmate after all, that the link hadn’t been lost after all this time.

Fear that something was wrong, that his absence all this time had injured them.

Sadness that this all had been hidden from him for so long.

And betrayal, even hatred, at his parents for letting him live so long thinking he would never have what everyone else did. For watching him suffer when they could have told him the truth at any time.

He had gained a soulmate, or at least the knowledge that they existed, but he just might have lost his parents. As much as Auradon preached that heroes must be forgiving above all else, he knew there were exceptions. After all, the villains on the Isle hadn’t been forgiven.

Eyes going wide, Ben let out a tiny gasp. “THE ISLE!” he hissed in realization. No wonder the secret had been hidden so well for so long. It was much easier to keep with a soulmate locked up in a place where the very concept was laughable. No wonder his similarly-cut off soulmate hadn’t felt any of the distress he had all these years. And no wonder his newly returned memories were full of bruises and fear.

“Carlos!” he said, disbelieving yet certain at the same time. “It’s Carlos!”

—

Carlos’s favorite experiment Yen Sid had ever showed him involved indigo carmine. The bizarre reaction caused a beautiful color change, red to green and back. It had been beautiful and strange and fascinating.

That was how Carlos felt now in his friendship with Ben. The color would start a warm, friendly green, only to turn- just for a moment- to a more intimate red. The truth would be obvious, but they would pretend not to see until the color was once again green.

In one of their red moments, as Carlos called them, he would talk to Ben about life on the Isle. Ben would offer sympathy, sometimes, until Carlos got annoyed and uncomfortable. Then it would simply be support.

And other times Ben would talk about his own parents, and Carlos would do his best to support him, as well, even if he wasn’t confident in his ability to do it.

The cycle continued.

Until the reaction started to burn itself out, and the changes in color became slower, less drastic. Calmer now, they were left to calmly accept where their color would settle.

And Carlos started to wonder about himself. Maybe he was an unreactive noble gas, but not all of them were completely inert. Some could, rarely, react, forming solids with fluorine or other elements. Or maybe he wasn’t a noble gas at all. Maybe he was a halogen, negatively charged, needing the balance of Ben’s endlessly positive energy.

Maybe he could accept Ben’s contributions. Ben could offer his kindness and energy, and Carlos could offer… well, he wasn’t sure what he could bring to the table, really, besides just being Ben’s soulmate, which was luck rather than anything special about him. But Ben seemed more than content to share whatever Carlos had.

Maybe Carlos had potential that only Ben could see, a rare and little-understood element. He could accept that.

—

The reaction continued, so slow it was impossible to watch in real time. It simply was measured in milestones.

Carlos, and his friends, chose good, chose Auradon, chose Ben, and Ben could barely hide his ecstasy when Carlos said how much joy Ben (and Dude, of course) gave him.

Ben and Carlos became just that; Ben and Carlos. They became a pair, an inseparable duo.

Carlos started to break through the pain of the Isle. It never went away, but the pain lessened. And Ben, for his part, began to recover from his own feelings of betrayal from his parents. It was a slow but certain recovery, measured in slowly-shed fears and learned behaviors.

On and on the reaction went, until the two became a sort of compound; still having their own identities, and yet having another identity together. It was what Ben had always wanted, and though it wasn’t that way for Carlos, he was more than happy with the result.

After all, most of the world’s chemical reactions weren’t planned, but were instead the result of random, happy events.

And a happy turn of fate was exactly what this new life was for both of them.


End file.
